Slytherin Loyalties
by Unseen
Summary: Goings on in the Slytherin common room... Time to put down the masks and chose sides of Pansy and Draco...
1. Default Chapter

Slytherin Loyalties  
  
Draco frowned at the letter tightly clutched in his hand. That wasn't good. Not at all good. Pansy entered the common room wearily and slumped down into one of the dark-green velvet armchairs facing the elegant fireplace. She looked towards him, a concerned look appearing in her eyes.  
  
"What's wrong Draco ?"  
  
He looked at her eloquently.  
  
"Oh. Bad news from home, right?"  
  
She seemed to melt further into the comforting warmth of her chair.  
  
"Haven't heard from my parents in ages. I wonder if. Draco, there isn't anything about them in that letter, is there ?"  
  
He winced at the dread tingeing her words. She looked terribly pale, and he suspected she hadn't been sleeping much these last weeks. How was he supposed to tell her? She looked. fragile, dwarfed in that immense armchair.  
  
The uncertain look in his eye was enough to confirm her suspicions. Draco quenched his urge to protect her from the blow the news would inevitably cause, remembering that Pansy was not one to be fussed around. He shuddered, recalling what had happened to the last of her boyfriends when he had tried to do just that. Pity this kind of information was strictly kept to the Slytherin common room: it would have made the Potter gang think twice about scorning her. But scorn wasn't what she despised most. An enemy who spoke daggers at her at least considered her apt to take it.  
  
"Tell me. Damn, tell me Draco! Just bloody hell *tell* me."  
  
Her eyes sparkled with determination, and something akin to anger. He shoved the parchment into her hand without comment. Words of comfort could do little, and he had never been good at them anyway. Slytherins dealt with things the harsh way. Not to mention the fact that comfort would have probably made her uncomfortable, to top it all off. She paled visibly as her eyes travelled over the script.  
  
"What will you do? Bow, Flight or Fight, Drac?"  
  
She laughed bitterly, and he gave her one of his rare smiles, albeit worn and tense, at the use of that phrase. They had been children once, and played this game. She would search for him throughout the Malfoy Mansion, and having cornered him, ask the question. But it wasn't a game anymore, and they wouldn't escape unharmed but for the occasional shiner. Her harsh laughter turned to dry sobs. No tears. Never. He stood behind her chair gravely considering her, the fire, the carved snake on the mantelpiece, and finally answered in the only way he possibly could:  
  
"I have no idea".  
  
They were silent for a while, and then she talked, not looking at him, deep blue eyes staring into the flames.  
  
"Drac, if I chose Bow. would you blame me? If we had to fight on opposite sides. if, say, I chose that, and you didn't. would you denounce me?"  
  
Her voice was stern and devoid of emotion, but he recognised his own defence system in that expressionlessness. After all, they *had* been trained together for many years, before Hogwarts, before they even knew there were alternatives. But were there? This line of thought brought him back to her question, which was even more disturbing to think about, if that was possible. Be loyal to the side you have chosen or to your childhood friend? A side encompassing the Gryffindors, these foolhardy, heroic, stupid, self-satisfied and assuming nuisances, encompassing -he shuddered- the self-righteous Harry Potter, who for all his supposed perfection could not find in him enough intelligence to grasp the fact that the Slytherins actually had it harder than him? Who had to make their life even worse, at that?  
  
He looked back at her. She was staring at him intently, as if trying to read his mind, which she probably could, he reflected. Her light, indefinably coloured hair was drawn back in a tight bun, doing nothing to soften the harsh lines of her features, prominent cheekbones, deeply shadowed, sunken marine eyes, or the drawn and tense lines in her face. So different from the carefree girl who chased him through the shadowed corridors of his house. Her hair had been short, then, and perpetually tousled, and she had been a tomboyish solid little person, so little like the tired, hardened young woman she now was. And yet she was still Pansy. He had grown to respect her, and even to like her for what she had become, in spite of all outward behaviour, outside of the privacy Slytherin territory. She'd have killed him, had he tried to defend her, thus hinting that she was a weakling. Playing the fool was her mask, and he had nothing but to respect that.  
  
Would he denounce her? The answer came to him naturally, and he realised that he had known all along. To answer otherwise would have been deprecatory.  
  
"I would. You knew that, didn't you ?"  
  
She smiled at him, a true smile. A smile that made his heart break at his decision but also comforted him in it.  
  
"What about you? Bow, Flight or Fight, Pansy ? Are you really going to Bow?"  
  
"Do not look at me for guidance. I don't want your mistakes on my conscience. I'll make my choice, and you will make yours. Hopefully." and she lowered her voice, muttering something he would never have expected her to, "we'll be on the same side".  
  
It took him a while to process what she had said, and she left, visibly embarrassed at her tampering with personal ethics. That she could have said something so. was amazing it itself. Between them, such things were known on both sides, but left unsaid. It helped prevent eventual guilt, should they have to act at each other's disadvantage.  
  
Well.. he took out a sheet of parchment, and swiftly scribbled a few words. Then taking out his wand, he tapped it briefly, muttering "Chep".  
  
In the seventh year's dormitory, underneath Pansy's closed and charm-sealed canopy, a piece of parchment appeared. It read:  
  
"Let me know on the night before Initiation. Please." 


	2. Chapter 2

Pansy absently crumpled Draco's note as she pondered its implications. She had been wrong to let her feelings show this evening. She should have learn by now that no good ever came out of it, and that even Draco was no exception to the rule. The worst part was that it had led *him* to disclose true position in this matter. "And it's all my fault. Yay." She laughed mirthlessly.  
  
Shaking these thoughts from her head, she crept under the covers, positioning her wand within easy reach under her pillow, and willed herself to sleep. It was too late to change things now anyway, and drowning oneself in guilt had never helped matters any. She would just have to choose accordingly, and that made the decision all the more difficult. Before, it was only a matter of knowing she would have to face him in battle one day, and fight for her life. Now it was a matter of risking to betray him at the first veritaserum interrogation should he choose to spy for Hogwarts. Could she do that? Betraying an adversary was not a problem to her, so long as she did it of her own volition. Now there was a definite threat that that wouldn't be the case.  
  
She shifted restlessly, tangling skinny limbs between the dark-green silk sheets. Why should sleep elude her tonight of all nights? She certainly needed all her wits about in the morning. She had a decision to take. "You did this on purpose didn't you, you cunning bastard ? But of course you have. Who other than Draco to trick me into supporting him in such a shamefully gryffindorish manner, so that I don't suspect that I was manipulated."  
  
Well. eye for eye. She picked a quill from the side of her bed and scribbled at the back of the tattered piece of parchment. 'I'll tell you. Afterwards.'  
  
"Afterwards?!" Draco mentally slapped himself for speaking out loud. Thank goodness his wards were up. At three in the morning, the dormitory was deadly silent and his word would have echoed like thunder.  
  
The note burst into flame a his unspoken command, and he cursed under his breath. She had either chosen to bow, or to fight as a spy. Either way, she would go. And she knew his mind.just as he knew hers. They were as good as dead. Unless he could persuade her not to go, to stay at Hogwarts under the Headmaster's protection.  
  
He cursed again, mentally berating himself for giving in to such a ridiculous urge as to try and save his comrade instead of just sacrificing her to save his skin. Then again, she obviously didn't intend to sacrifice him either. If they both made it, it was a profitable choice, but if one should fall, then the other would follow him down. "God I hate group work!" And he flopped back in his pillows.  
  
"Professor Snape?"  
  
Said professor lifted his eyes from his cauldron and eyed Pansy Parkinson expressionlessly. She was thinner, he noticed. And visibly more pale than she had ever been. She had never sought him out before, merely letting him observe her from afar and indicating that she knew and gave him her leave to do so. After some consideration, Severus muttered an extinguishing spell and checked his cauldron one last time before silently motioning her towards his office.  
  
"Miss Parkinson."  
  
Pansy let no emotion show, yet if she had she would have swallowed uneasily. As it was, she took a letter out of her pocket and handed it over to her Head of House, who scanned it quickly, then looked expectantly up at her.  
  
"I thought you were entitled to be aware of this. And of the fact that I will be answering the summons."  
  
"And why, pray?"  
  
"I know what you are, professor. Idon't plan on betraying you, but if I am to be Initiated, there is a risk that I will be dosed with veritaserum or a variant, and you should be careful."  
  
"Why all this if you have no wish to advantage your seemingly chosen side by betraying me?"  
  
She laughed bitterly.  
  
"Seemingly indeed! You are not unaware, I trust, of my. familial predicament. This is the only way I will be allowed to choose. And I want to be free, professor. Being a spy for Dumbledore is the only way for me to express my choice if I have a will to live."  
  
Severus sighed, and Pansy was taken unawares by the sudden defeat that dulled his eyes.  
  
"I admire your determination, Pansy. I wish there was another way. You of course realise that should I be identified as I spy subsequently to your action, you would have to take my place as Dumbledore's pet death eater? It is not an easy position, child, even when compared to your limited alternatives."  
  
He considered the girl seated primly in front of him. She could do it.  
  
"I do."  
  
That was it then. No noisy declarations of fidelity, no solemn oaths. So like yet unlike the night he himself made his choice. He felt a surge of pride at the thought that it was partly his presence that had turned the confused eleven-years-old Parkinson child into such a steady young woman. No Gryffindor could ever hope to reach this level of willpower, resolution. and measure. And he had to ensure his children were safe once he was gone as well.  
  
"Pansy."  
  
She quirked her eyebrow at him in a way that reminded him so strongly of himself he almost lost his gravity, and yet which comforted him in his decision.  
  
"Will you be my successor? This is an official request: I need a replacement worthy of our House once I retire. I had been thinking either of you or of young Malfoy, but it would seem you are the most indicated after all." and I might need replacement unexpectedly soon, he mentally added.  
  
The girl smiled a strained smile at him, and nodded briefly before silently exiting the room, and Severus was left alone with his thoughts.  
  
A/N: Tremendous thanks to all reviewers: this was meant to be only in one part, but I actually made a whole story out of it. A warning: this will go back in time a bit in a little while. to talk about other loyalties, and about betrayal, and a lot more about Snape.( Gosh I love this character!!!!!) Sorry to disappoint Darco/Pansy fans: they will not be the main characters of this fic after all. Though they will still frequently make an appearance. Thank you again, and I hope the sequel will meet your standards. (still not much going on here I'm afraid, but next chapter will introduce some action, I promise!) 


End file.
